The debilitating effects of budget delay

              

                  By Bayo Ogunmupe

    That loan of N1.649 trillion will be needed to finance the projected N1.859 trillion deficit in the 2019 budget is difficult to understand. This comes after cries and warnings from economists that Nigeria is presently amassing unsustainable debt in the face of our dwindling oil revenue. Such additional borrowing will escalate our total debt to N2.4 trillion. And with our debt servicing of N2.4 trillion in 2019 up from N2.0 trillion in 2018. Notwithstanding, 21 million Nigerians remain unemployed and with our worsening foreign exchange outlook.

    In order that Nigeria may craft a wholesome budget now on debate in the National Assembly, the Nigeria Economic Outlook Conference (NEOC) was convened at Eko Hotel, Lagos on the ides of January this year. The Neoc is a platform for the finest of business and economics minds to build a coalition of ideas towards Nigeria's long term prosperity. The conference affirmed that budget delay is responsible for poverty and underdevelopment in Nigeria. Therefore NOEC seeks to provide the framework for understanding the global economic growth and prosperity outlook. Also, NEOC recognises that our current legal, budgetary and economic architecture isn't likely to deliver prosperity to Nigerians 

    Moreover, the sum of the world's economic progress is measured by the cumulative budgetary projects implemented. Over all, our economic reform efforts are weak, half baked, garbled, inconsistent and late in implementation. Cogent policy and timely budgeting implementation have been cited as the mechanism essential for Nigeria's economic prosperity. In June 2018, the U.S. Brookings Institution found that Nigeria has overtaken India to become the country with the largest population of people living in extreme poverty. The report showed further that Nigeria has 87 million people in extreme poverty and that this population is increasing at six people per minute. The report concluded that the Nigerian poverty is fueled by low economic growth, high inequality and rapid population growth.

    In November 2018, Nigeria's National Bureau of Statistics released its report on unemployment in Nigeria. The report showed that unemployment increased from 18.8 percent in 2017 to 23.1 percent in 2018, up by five percent in one year. Also, our labour force expanded by 15 million people in the three years between 2015 and 2018. Indeed, the 2018 Demographic Health Survey by UNICEF of the Nigerian government showed that the population of out of school children in Nigeria has risen from 10.5 million to 13.2 million. Thus, incessant budget delay by the Nigerian Parliament is responsible for Nigeria's descent into poverty. The National Assembly should therefore expedite the passing and implementation of the 2019 budget.

    The year's budget coming after the first quarter of 2019, like previous budgets will manifest in its sub optimal implementation. Though the federal budget represents less than 10 percent of expenditure in the Nigerian economy, it has a significant accelerator effect on the country, particularly on the private sector. Thus, the present low paced national growth is due in part to avoidable delay in the budget process. Budget delay is reflected in the projects featured in the 2019 budget. Of the N162 billion counterpart funding made for the Maiduguri Railway listed as new in the 2018 budget, also appears as new project in the 2019 budget. This sort of narrative does not pave way for the correct assessment of progress and growth in the execution of projects in Nigeria.

    Lastly, the debilitating effect of budget delay is traceable to the Nigerian economy being unable to create opportunities for youth employment. Jobs for the ballooning youth population is the most pressing national emergency. Certainly, the government has neither the financial capacity nor the coterie of experts to create the jobs needed to absorb our youth population in order to keep them away from mischief. Perhaps a supplementary budget should be in the works with a strong collaboration with the private sector. With that, government can then begin a strategic engagement with the labour unions and foreign investors on how they can help us stem the tide of insecurity in the country.